When it comes to interface design, choice is bad. Choice makes people think. And you don’t want to make people think. Unfortunately, computer programmers love to think. It’s what they do. Programmers are paid to think up as many combinations, permutations and scenarios as possible.This can result in an interface that’s overly complex. Reducing or even eliminating choice allows people to focus on what they want to do and have fun while doing it.

Imagine driving a car with three brake pedals instead of one. One pedal stops the front wheels. One pedal stops the rear wheels. And one pedal stops all four. Let’s also say our car has an anti-lock option that’s activated by a special lever. Now imagine someone just jumped in front of your car. Not good. Choose the best option for the user and provide (or highlight) that one choice.

Here’s a real world example. Recently I was asked to review a website that a friend of mine put together. One of the components was a photo gallery. Fun, right? Everyone loves photos! So I clicked the link and got a collection of thumbnails. Ok. I clicked a thumbnail and got… more thumbnails. No photos. Huh? I clicked again. More thumbnails. No photos. I clicked five times before I got to a photo. One photo.

What just happened? Why had it taken so long to get to this one photo? When I retraced my steps, I realized that all those thumbnails were not photo gallery links, they were subcategories. His site had one photo buried under five levels of hierarchy. Imagine the potential for a 5 level hierarchy to branch out. The resulting tree would be huge. You would never find anything. Which is ironic considering that the intent was to make it easier to find things by having everything so meticulously categorized.

As with any kind of design, in interface design, sometimes perfection achieved not when there is not longer anything else to add, but when there is no longer anything else that you can take away.

Collaboration is a huge part of what we do. And creative minds don't always think alike. But that's what keeps things interesting around here. This post was written in cooperation by members of the Trampoline Branding staff.